(Suzy Chaffee) Following Bolivia’s passage of their domestic law “Recognizing Mother Earth as a living entity and giving Her the Same Rights as Humans,” the United Nations held a dialogue via an interactive webcast on its “Harmony with Nature” Day, April 20, and it is now working on adopting these rights worldwide. Read more…
Quite simply, human-centered governance systems are not working and we need new economic, development and environmental policies.
(Maude Barlow) We all know that the earth and all upon it face a growing crisis. Global climate change is rapidly advancing, melting glaciers, eroding soil, causing freak and increasingly wild storms, and displacing untold millions from rural communities to live in desperate poverty in peri-urban slums. Almost every human victim lives in the global South, in communities not responsible for greenhouse gas emissions. The atmosphere has already warmed up almost a full degree in the last several decades and a new Canadian study reports that we may be on course to add another 6 degrees Celsius (10.8 degrees Fahrenheit) by 2100. Read more…
Sixty-fifth session
Item 20 (i) the provisional agenda
Sustainable Development: Harmony with Nature
HARMONY WITH NATURE
Report of the Secretary-General
Summary
The present report is submitted pursuant to the General Assembly resolution 64/196 entitled Harmony with Nature, inviting Member States, the United Nations system, and other stakeholders to transmit to the Secretary-General their views, experiences and proposals on promoting life in harmony with nature. The resolution requested the Secretary-General to submit a report on the subject to the 65th Session of the General Assembly. Drawing on the inputs received, the present report addresses how sustainable development approaches and initiatives have allowed communities gradually to reconnect with the Earth. Concrete recommendations are provided to facilitate further consideration of the theme by Member States. Read more…
Cochabamba and the Civilizational Root of the Climate Crisis
(Roberto Lovato) Leonardo Boff’s elegant white beard and wavy white hair make him look like classical depictions of God(s) in ancient and early modern art. And as a catholic priest, he would appear to be both benefactor and bulwark of what’s often called “western civilization.” But when you ask the world-renowned catholic theologian about the root causes of the climate crisis being discussed and debated at the CMPCC here in Cochabamba, Bolivia, he does indeed speak passionately about western civilization-as the primary cause of that crisis.
“Nature does in fact have its ups and downs, its changes in temperature,” says Boff, who lives in Brazil. “But as scientists are now warning us, 90 or more percent of the increases in temperature are caused by human activity, not the activity of the Aymara, Quechua and other indigenous groups here (in Bolivia), but of those of us belonging to the civilizational system based on the exploitation of natural and human resources for profit, the western civilizational system.” Read more…
Considering that climate change represents a real threat to the existence of humanity, of living beings and our Mother Earth as we know it today;
Noting the serious danger that exists to islands, coastal areas, glaciers in the Himalayas, the Andes and mountains of the world, poles of the Earth, warm regions like Africa, water sources, populations affected by increasing natural disasters, plants and animals, and ecosystems in general;
Making clear that those most affected by climate change will be the poorest in the world who will see their homes and their sources of survival destroyed, and who will be forced to migrate and seek refuge; Read more…
(Buenos Aires Herald) Bolivian city of Cochabamba will be the venue for the World Summit for Climate Change from April 19th to April 22nd 2010, announced Bolivian President Evo Morales. The summit, organized as a world conference of social movements, will operate as a response to the failure of the 15th Summit on Climate Change, recently held in Copenhagen. Read more…
(Oxfam.org.uk) “Bolivia is a country particularly vulnerable to the impacts of climate change. In July 2009, a team of Oxfam researchers travelled to three areas of Bolivia (Trinidad in Beni, the Cochabamba valleys and Khapi under Mount Illimani, in La Paz) to take a snapshot of how poor families are experiencing the changing climate, and how they are adapting to it. Poor women and men throughout Bolivia are already experiencing the consequences of climate change, but in most cases are ill-equipped to adapt to the present and future impacts. Read more…
(Elizabeth Peredo Beltrán*) The climate change we are living is not any crisis, it is a global alert about the way toward self destruction that the powerful have chosen, given the lack of equitable possibilities that the world need in order to survive –the indigenous peoples, the social groups living in poverty, women, the elderly and children are the most affected by it in today’s world.
Read more…
1) Do you agree with reestablishing harmony with nature while recognizing the rights of mother earth? YES or NO
2) Do you agree with changing this model of over-consumption and waste that represents the capitalist system? YES or NO
3) Do you agree that developed countries reduce and reabsorb their domestic greenhouse gas emissions for temperature not to rise more than 1 degree Celsius? YES or NO
4) Do you agree with transferring all that is spent in wars and for allocating a budget bigger than that used for defense to climate change? YES or NO
5) Do you agree with a Climate Justice Tribunal to judge those who destroy Mother Earth? YES or NO
STATEMENT OF THE PRESIDENT OF THE PLURINATIONAL STATE OF BOLIVIA, EVO MORALES, IN PRESS CONFERENCE
COPENHAGUEN – DENMARK (*)
In debates with many social movements we shared that: the Earth, the Mother Earth, the nature can exist without humans, but humans cannot live without the Earth. It is more important to defend the rights of Mother Earth, the law of nature, than to defend human rights. Defending the rights of the Earth is to defend life, is to save mankind. Read more…
